First Deep-Sea Mining Company Asks Trump for International Permit
U.S. waters.Vancouver-based The Metals Co asked the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for a commercial recovery permit under the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act of 1980 to operate in part of the Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and Mexico known as the Clarion-Clipperton Zone.The application was timed to coincide with a Tuesday hearing on deep-sea mining by a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee at which Gerard Barron, CEO of The Metals Co, testified."America has an urgent need for critical minerals. It needs to secure these metals," said
Trump Order Fast Tracks Subsea Mining
available under existing U.S. law, we look forward to delivering the world's first commercial nodule project, responsibly and economically," said Gerard Barron, CEO of the company, which aims to extract nodules from a vast plain of the Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and Mexico known as the Clarion-Clipperton Zone.Beyond The Metals Company, others eyeing deep-sea mining include California-based Impossible Metals, Russia's JSC Yuzhmorgeologiya, Blue Minerals Jamaica, China Minmetals, and Kiribati's Marawa Research and Exploration.U.S. access to critical minerals - especially those produced
Deep-Sea Mining Test Caused Distant Sediment Change
Independent researchers from the MiningImpact project and the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR) monitored the test of an industrial pre-prototype nodule collector vehicle in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone in the eastern Pacific and found that the spread of the suspended sediment plumes could reach 4.5 kilometers (2.8 miles).The project is coordinated by the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, has been investigating the potential environmental impacts of deep-sea mining since 2015. Previous analyses of decade-old disturbance traces in the Clarion-Clipperton
Deep-sea Mining: A New Gold Rush or Environmental Disaster?
In the depths of the Pacific Ocean between Mexico and Hawaii, trillions of potato-shaped rocks are scattered across the seabed - containing minerals such as nickel, cobalt and manganese vital for new green technologies in the global energy transition.In this ocean region - the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) - an abundance of the rocks, known as polymetallic nodules, is increasingly fuelling debate about the mining of metals needed to produce technology such as batteries for electric vehicles.Environmentalists say deep-sea mining could cause major damage to ecosystems that scientists know little about
UN to Start Taking Deep-sea Mining Applications This July
standards for the new and controversial practice.Deep-sea mining would extract cobalt, copper, nickel, and manganese - key battery materials - from potato-sized rocks called "polymetallic nodules" on the ocean's floor at depths of 4 to 6 km (2.5 to 4 miles). They are abundant in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) in the North Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and Mexico.The ISA's governing council formulated a draft decision on Thursday after meeting in Jamaica that allows companies to file permit applications starting on July 9, a deadline set in motion by actions the island nation
Norway's Loke Buys UK Deep-sea Mining Firm from Lockheed
Norway's Loke Marine Minerals has acquired deep-sea mining firm UK Seabed Resources (UKSR) from Lockheed Martin, the companies said on Thursday.UKSR holds a 100% interest in two deep sea mineral licences in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) in the Pacific Ocean, and a 19.9% interest in the Ocean Mineral Singapore, licences issued by the International Seabed Authority (ISA)."We've got the approval from the UK government... Our ambition is to start extraction from 2030," Hans Olav Hide, Loke's chairman, told Reuters.Companies that also hold exploration licences for swathes of the
NOC Expedition Seeks Answers on Subsea Mining Impacts
and improving the supply chain of these minerals. The strategy also asks important questions about whether to engage in the extraction of metals and minerals on the seabed and how to do it.The expeditions runs from February 5 to March 26, 2023 from Costa Rica to the Central Pacific in an area called the Clarion Clipperton Zone (CCZ) at abyssal depths of almost 5,000 meters. SMARTEX is funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and its project partners. Natural History Museum, British Geological Survey, Heriot Watt University, JNCC, (Joint Nature Conservation Committee), Liverpool University
Subsea Mining Plans Pit Renewable Energy Demand Against Ocean Life
a ban on deep sea mining.As scholars who have long focused on the economic, political and legal challenges posed by deep seabed mining, we have each studied and written on this economic frontier with concern for the regulatory and ecological challenges it poses.Manganese nodules on the seafloor in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, between Hawaii and Mexico, captured on camera by a remote vehicle in 2015. ROV KIEL 6000, GEOMAR, CC BYWhat’s down there, and why should we care?A curious journey began in the summer of 1974. Sailing from Long Beach, California, a revolutionary ship funded by eccentric billionaire
TMC's NORI, Allseas Lift 3,000t of Seabed Nodules from Pacific Ocean
TMC, the company that describes itself as an explorer of the world’s largest estimated undeveloped source of critical battery metals, said Monday that its subsidiary NORI and offshore partner Allseas had successfully concluded the first integrated system test in the Clarion Clipperton Zone of the Pacific Ocean since the 1970s, achieving all significant pilot milestones while collecting approximately 4,500 tonnes of seafloor polymetallic nodules. More than 3,000 tons of nodules were moved up a 4.3-kilometer-long riser system to the surface production vessel Hidden Gem. Another 1,500 tons of
February 2025
